September 27, 2009

conserva di frutta / fruit preserves

Last year I wrote a post on marmellata, where I described how I was making jam, or, to be more precise, fruit spread. This past June, I purchased a book called Preserving the Taste by Edon Waycott. I also took a conserve making class from June Taylor. As a result, recently I have been following a different process to preserve fruit. I am still exploring different options and nothing is settled, but I can tell you a few things I have been experimenting with.

First of all, I am still not using pectin. Waycott's book lists fruits by pectin contents. Since I like to mix different kinds of fruit to make a jar of preserve, I choose a combination that sounds interesting and gives me a good quantity of natural pectin. I now macerate the fruit for several hours before cooking it, after adding an amount of sugar equivalent to 20% of the weight of the fruit (weighed after being prepared). I cook the fruit for a shorter time than I used to. Finally, I jar the hot preserve according to the method described in this post (see step 4).

This being blackberry season (stagione delle more) and blackberries being plentiful around me, I have been using this fruit, usually in combination with apples (mele). I purée the blackberries and run through a mesh strainer to remove the pips. It is a bit of work, but I think it is worth the effort. Plus, I love the color of the resulting preserve. The photo shows apples and blackberry purée in the saucepan.

My most recent experiment was rather accidental. I made macedonia di frutta (fruit salad) with a mix of ripe fruit (no sugar or lemon juice, just a fruit medley), and added to it palline di melone (small melon balls). I ended up making a bit too much and decided to turn the leftovers (avanzi) into the beginning of a batch of fruit preserve. I added more fruit, mostly apples, sugar, some fresh orange juice and macerated for a few hours.

By then, there was a lot of juice in the bowl, quite a bit of it due to the melon. I filtered some of it (about a cup) into a small saucepan and boiled it gently until reduced by half to obtain sciroppo di frutta (fruit syrup). I put it in a small sterilized jar, let it cool and stored it in the fridge. I will figure out a nice way to use it. I poured the fruit and the rest of the juice in a saucepan to make preserve.

I don't peel the apples and mash them with a potato masher after 10 minutes of cooking. I then cook a bit longer, the exact amount of time depending on the state of the fruit mixture: keep in mind that it will thicken as it cools. After I turn off the heat, I jar the preserve right away, as described in the post mentioned above. Once cooled, I label the jars so I know what fruit is in it, the quantity of sugar and the date of preparation. I store my vasetti (jars) in the fridge. I am also testing a different set up for longer term conservation, but I prefer not to describe it until I have the results of my experiment.

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Last year I wrote a post on marmellata, where I described how I was making jam, or, to be more precise, fruit spread. This past June, I purchased a book called Preserving the Taste by Edon Waycott. I also took a conserve making class from June Taylor. As a result, recently I have been following a different process to preserve fruit. I am still exploring different options and nothing is settled, but I can tell you a few things I have been experimenting with.

First of all, I am still not using pectin. Waycott's book lists fruits by pectin contents. Since I like to mix different kinds of fruit to make a jar of preserve, I choose a combination that sounds interesting and gives me a good quantity of natural pectin. I now macerate the fruit for several hours before cooking it, after adding an amount of sugar equivalent to 20% of the weight of the fruit (weighed after being prepared). I cook the fruit for a shorter time than I used to. Finally, I jar the hot preserve according to the method described in this post (see step 4).

This being blackberry season (stagione delle more) and blackberries being plentiful around me, I have been using this fruit, usually in combination with apples (mele). I purée the blackberries and run through a mesh strainer to remove the pips. It is a bit of work, but I think it is worth the effort. Plus, I love the color of the resulting preserve. The photo shows apples and blackberry purée in the saucepan.

My most recent experiment was rather accidental. I made macedonia di frutta (fruit salad) with a mix of ripe fruit (no sugar or lemon juice, just a fruit medley), and added to it palline di melone (small melon balls). I ended up making a bit too much and decided to turn the leftovers (avanzi) into the beginning of a batch of fruit preserve. I added more fruit, mostly apples, sugar, some fresh orange juice and macerated for a few hours.

By then, there was a lot of juice in the bowl, quite a bit of it due to the melon. I filtered some of it (about a cup) into a small saucepan and boiled it gently until reduced by half to obtain sciroppo di frutta (fruit syrup). I put it in a small sterilized jar, let it cool and stored it in the fridge. I will figure out a nice way to use it. I poured the fruit and the rest of the juice in a saucepan to make preserve.

I don't peel the apples and mash them with a potato masher after 10 minutes of cooking. I then cook a bit longer, the exact amount of time depending on the state of the fruit mixture: keep in mind that it will thicken as it cools. After I turn off the heat, I jar the preserve right away, as described in the post mentioned above. Once cooled, I label the jars so I know what fruit is in it, the quantity of sugar and the date of preparation. I store my vasetti (jars) in the fridge. I am also testing a different set up for longer term conservation, but I prefer not to describe it until I have the results of my experiment.

To use any of the photographs published in the blog permission must be obtained from Simona
No food was (nor will ever be) discarded in the process of taking the photographs, i.e., everything was consumed either immediately or in due time